Five Times Dani Doesn't Lose her VirginityAnd The One Time She Does
by AnnaEndedTheWorld
Summary: "Dani's been having some fecking fucked up dreams lately." Five ways a superhero might lose her virginity, and the one way she actually does. Rated M, but a pretty soft M.
1. i: Ryodan

Author's Note: Wow. Haven't done this in a while. Anyway, ICED has taken over my life, and I needed to write this story so I could get back to my original stuff.

I initially intended it to be 6, really short drabbles. I quite honestly don't know what happened. I also intended chapter 6 to end with someone else but clearly my psyche had other plans. Le Sigh.

For fun, I'll include the music I was listening to while writing.

* * *

****_Go away now, just let me go_

_Are you stupid, or just a little slow_

_Go away now, I've made myself clear:_

_Nah, it's not gonna happen, not in a million years_

_(Lily Allen, "Knock 'Em Out")_

**i. (Or: Ryodan)**

Dani is 15 (and a half, if you asked her, but of course, no one does), and she is fecking PISSED OFF. Ryodan just dumped Jo, and Jo has been crying and won't get out of bed, and like, far as Dani knows, being a superhero don't mean eating ice cream (not that there's any ice cream, so it's just tea, tea and more tea) and bitching about how all men suck, all girlfriend-like. That ain't in the job description! Dani is tired, and overwhelmed, and she wants to kill Ryodan (like, dude'll only come back anyway) but Jo doesn't know that, and Jo won't let her.

"It's not his fault. I knew what I was getting into," Jo says, forlornly staring at her now sparkle-less chest.

Kat and Mac (thank feck, Dani thinks, for small favors: Mac has forgiven Dani and is back to being the second pea in the Mega pod!) share a look over Jo's head, but don't say anything. Kat's is troubled, like she doesn't think Jo's coming back from this anytime soon. Like she used her empath spidey sense and went deep into Jo's head and what she saw in there is no good. Mac's is pissed off, and weary - pissed at Ryodan, Dani bets, for being a dickhead. Dani's not sure why she's weary, but later on her way out, Mac mentions someone named Fiona and suggests lightly to Dani that she best stay away from Chester's.

"Like I want to go to THAT FECKING HELLHOLE," Dani explodes, forgetting at that moment that she still has to report for work at 8 that night.

When 8 rolls around, and Jo insists it's okay that she goes, says she should probably go too, that she doesn't think her contract is up, Dani has had enough. Won't admit it, but frankly is looking forward to getting out of this estrogen filled, sewing circle. Dani wants Dancer, but hasn't been able to find him, not for days. Not about to worry, but ... 's weird, that's all.

* * *

When she walks into Chester's that night, she's about to lay into Ryodan. He's standing at the top of the stairs, and taking everyone in - girls, mostly. Jo tries not to look at him, to square her shoulders, but Dani knows. She can see it in the way Jo's hand shakes. At that moment, Dani wants to launch herself at him and pummel the shit out of him for hurting her friend.

Lor appears at her side, immediately.

"Boss wants you." To Jo, he says, "Sweetheart, you don't have to be here. Your contract was ... terminated."

For a second, Dani wants to whoop. "What the feck about my contract? I want to be terminated. This is BULLSHIT."

Jo turns to her, and there is rage in her eyes. "Dani. Stop. Fucking. Fighting my battles for me."

Dani is... impressed. Lor even quirks a smile. Ain't never heard Jo swear. Not once.

Jo turns and leaves. Dani watches her for a second, but she gets lost in the crowd. She's about to follow her out, make sure she's safe, but Lor stops her, restraining her with a hand on her arm.

"Honey, you got somewhere to be."

"He looks busy. Wouldn't want to intrude on the ... head nodding. What skank is it gonna be tonight?" Dani's been trying to cut the question marks out of her speech when she's at Chester's, wants to seem as blase as possible here, but the fact that Ryodan is already trolling for new booty, just like Dani knew he would be, is pissing her off. Frankly, makes her mad, madder than just him fecking over Jo that way, but Dani isn't about to ask herself why.

Lor laughs, then looks her over, with an appraising look.

"You look good, honey. Real good." She put on tight black jeans tonight, tight black shirt. Left her hair down. Has makeup on even, because Mac insisted on doing it. Usually she'd protest, but ... the Mega wears what she wants. Still, she gives Lor a weary glance.

"Dude, you don't like, have a club or chloroform in the vicinity, do ya? Cuz last I checked, I wasn't your type."

Lor just laughs again, and gives her an appraising look. "Honey, we both know you didn't dress that way for me."

Dani feels his gaze on her, and looks up. Their eyes lock. Dani doesn't know what Ryodan's look means; like usual, she doesn't want to know. But things feel tight in her belly and if she could give the thought a name, she'd say - apprehension. Like something huge is about to happen, some big change she won't be able to pull back from.

Ryodan smiles, and there's some promise in his gaze. Dani has to fist her hand, or she'll run it through her hair. Ain't never run from no experience, not once, but suddenly she feels like maybe running is a good idea. As she considers this, Ryodan just nods.

At her.

At her! Mother. Fecker.

Just once, one nod, but he extends his hand and starts walking down the stairs.

Dani feels sour to the point of nausea.

"Ain't never gonna be no dude's booty call," she informs Lor, but she's looking at Ryodan, and from the way he freezes, goes absolutely still, she knows that somehow, somehow, dude heard her, too.

She freeze frames out of there so fast, she's pretty sure there's an actual Tasmanian Devil style dust spiral floating behind her.

* * *

She leaves too fast to see Ryodan slam his fist into a wall, tear apart his office, and shut down Chester's early.

She leaves to fast to notice Jo, with some of the other kiddie club waitresses, drinking and watching her. Would have seen Jo's horrified look, her swallow. How her gaze went ... bad.

Dani would have been impressed with Jo, too. Who went after Ryodan, punched him a wallop, and read him the riot act before she got thrown out.

"You never. Touch her. You hear me?"

"Don't tell me what to do."

Jo's heart is breaking, but she's not a monster. There was a part of her, she thinks, that always knew she was a placeholder. But Dani is hers, too. Not just his. And she's not about to let him wreck her. He scares her, but not that much.

"Fifteen."

"Sixteen, actually." His voice is soft, and he looks ... amused.

"Fine. Sixteen. I don't care what world we live in, that's statutory rape."

Ryodan's voice goes even quieter, but Jo has spent enough time with him to be able to read his tells. He's not immune to that fact. Were he, he wouldn't have ever taken up with Jo in the first place.

"Be very, very careful, Jo, about what you accuse me of. There are lines even I won't cross."

When the men come to escort her off the premises, Jo shoves them off.

Dani definitely misses Mac and Barrons, who come in towards the end, just in time to spectate on the tons of wreckage that Ryodan has caused. Barrons looks concerned, or as concerned as Barrons ever looks. Mac laughs her head off.

"You'd think," she tells Ryodan when he finally comes downstairs later, feet swinging from a bar stool as she sips a Macallan neat, "That after however many aeons you've been around, you'd have figured out a smoother approach than that. The nod? You gave Dani a nod? Right after you dumped her friend? What are you, an unkillable frat boy?"

"Get," Ryodan says, slow and soft, "her the fuck out of here, Barrons. Before I take care of her myself."

* * *

The next time Dani sees Ryodan, they both pretend the whole thing never happened. Lor just shakes his head at both of them a lot and takes up muttering.

"This is why I don't do serious. No misunderstandings, no complications," he says, but he might as well be telling himself, for all the response he gets from either.


	2. ii: Dancer

_We're so close to something better left unknown_

_We're so close, to something better left unknown_

_I can feel it in my bones _

_(Metric, "Gimme Sympathy")_

******ii. (or: **Dancer)

It's Dani's 16th birthday, and she and Dancer are having the absolute PERFECT night. Dancer raided the old video stores and grabbed a bunch of old, scary-as-feck movies: _The Exorcist_ and _Saw I_ and _Alien_ and _Alien vs. Predator_. Mac made a cake, but left it with Dancer (with a wink that made Dani turn pink, and gah what is with her these days?!) and he lit candles and played her the guitar and sang happy birthday, and Dani was so fecking embarrassed that when she made fun of him for being so cheesy, she was almost mean. The Mega! Embarassed! Imagine that!

"It's not cheesy, Mega," Dancer replied, and put down the guitar and looked at her seriously for a second. "It's something I wanted to do. For a long time, actually."

Then they ate cake and told each other all sorts of crazy shit, and now it's getting late and somehow - Dani's not sure how - she's found herself leaning back in Dancer's big arms while they watch the finale to The Exorcist. Dancer's arms have gotten bigger, more toned, somehow, and Dani is trying to notice how they feel around her back, or how warm his chest is while his heart beats an unsteady, fast rhythm against her head. It feels safe, and scary, both at the same time.

The priest is falling out the window when Dancer takes the remote from her hands and turns off the movie, pitching the room they're in into blackness. And that weird speed up that Dani's heart is doing? She can pretend it's because she's worried about shades, but shades been gone a long time, and 'sides, Dani's not the type to lie.

"Dude," she pokes at Dancer, turning in his arms to look at him. His eyes are vast and there's so much in them, Dani's not sure if she fell in, she'd ever get out again. Cheesy, that, but Dani's never been much of a poet. That's Dancer's job. "Dude," she tries again, aiming for playful even if the breathy catch in her voice maybe gives her a bit away, "I was watching that!"

"Dude," Dancer says back, and then he leans in and his lips are on hers and it's probably the sweetest thing that's ever happened to Dani. Like, she's pretty sure there's some explosive soundtrack in the background, like this is some American TV show and they've finally reached the episode where the characters everyone's been waiting for to get together, get together.

And later, when clothes come off, and they get... down to business as it were, and things are all slow and Dancer is breathing heavy and staring into her eyes, if things aren't quite as ... well, epic, as Dani had been hoping for her first time? She's certainly not complaining.

Later, Dani is laying Dancer's arms, playing her fingers on his chest, and the two are quiet together. Don't need to talk to understand each other, never did.

"Wow, Mega, that was ..."

"Pathetic," a voice says from the corner, and steps out into the light, and of-fecking-course it is Ryodan. His voice is mocking, but his eyes are ... Dani's never seen him look so scary. Like there's something in there, violent and raging, and it wants OUT.

When Ryodan's men surround them, and Ryodan himself grabs a mostly naked Dani and drags her away from a now-at-gunpoint Dancer, who stares at her with sad but bemused eyes, Dani can't seem to bring herself to freeze frame. Of all the FECKING times for her superpowers to go on holiday!

Ryodan's hands are warm, too warm, on Dani. One is on her waist, the other her neck, and one strokes while the other squeezes, and Dani doesn't want to be feeling what she's feeling right now. Not after what just happened with Dancer. Not ever. Dani's no skank. She controls her body, not the other way around.

"I told you," he says softly, too softly, into her ear, and she can't help it, she fucking shivers when he does, "That you signed an exclusivity contract. And that you wouldn't like the terms if you broke it. Well, here are the terms. See,"

and at that moment, the one named Kasteo (Dani commits this to memory, so she knows who to kill first once she gets her abilities back) shoots Dancer point blank and he falls to the ground with a soft thud,

"that you don't make the same mistake again."

Then Ryodan hauls her - naked - over his shoulder, and when he rests his hand on her ass and Dani pounds her fists into his back and she is thinking of all the ways she's going to kill him when the craziest. fucking. thing. happens.

Dancer stands up. Literally. From being shot! Crumpled heap on the ground and all that! And then Dancer laughs. Just laughs. Dani's never heard him laugh like that, like there are layers of Dancers, all of them, laughing at once, different ages and ... And as he does, his skin, his being - the part that made Dancer Dancer, just sort of ... falls off. And what is left is something vast and dark and beautiful and just a little bit insane.

"I knew," Lor growls from the corner, his gun up and trained on this, this Stranger, "That Dancer was a bullshit name."

Dani - who is now back on the floor, since something else unthinkable has happened and even fucking Ryodan is fecking thrown by this latest development - looks at what, who, can only be the Unseelie King. And what the hell can she do? She laughs. She laughs and laughs, till she can't breathe, till she's crying. Because, because...

Because she said she wanted her first time to be epic.

Should have fucking specified.


	3. iii: The Unseelie Princes

****_We're covered in fingerprints from thumbing the pages, looking for some escape. _

_But all the bold letters they just say the same thing: There's no way out of this..._

_(Chris Pureka, "Damage Control")_

**iii. (The Unseelie Princes)**

Dani fecking told them, didn't she? Told Lor (forgot to tell Ryodan, oh well, too damn late for that now) they needed to watch out; if the UPs managed to turn her Pri-ya, they were one step closer to the next apocalypse. That Dani would be turned against them.

Dani hadn't really worried about it, same way she never really worried about anything. Hard to worry when you're a super hero! Got a whole world to save. Worryings for old regular slow mo Joes, not the mega.

(She should have worried about it. Really, should have.)

When they catch her, she's just moseying down the street one afternoon. Seriously, moseying. Not freeze framing or popping up Dani Dailies or anything. The sun was nice and it was warm and she had just left Chester's and Ryodan these days was weirding her out with all those extra looks she was getting from him. Not to mention that things had gotten ugly that day; Dani wanted to go after the Crimson Hag, rescue Christian, take her down once and for all.

"It's my fault she got out, boss. And it's been three months. Who knows what's left of Christian's sanity."

"Exactly. Your fault. Not mine. Why should it concern me what she does from this point forward."

"You just gonna leave her Christian for an eternity?"

"Her having your little Highlander boyfriend solves all sorts of problems for me."

"Yea? Like what?"

Ryodan refuses to answer. Lor, having struck out, blonde bimbo wise - he seemed to be doing that more and more these days when Dani was around, hadn't dragged some girl off by her hair in a long time, Dani was noticing - walked her out. The two had a whole new way of doing things: They'd bump hips and see who could shove the other off their feet farther.

Lor was fun. Awesome. Slowly but surely becoming the shit. One day when Ryodan was too "busy to babysit" Dani, Lor came wandering into Ryodan's office, wheeling a DVD player and pile of old movies.

"You need some real education, not whatever horse shit they consider action movies," he told her. And they settled down to it. Once they made their way through the Kung Fus, they started up on Tarantino. Dani liked Kill Bill 2 the best. Lor told her that was sacrilege.

"No one loves anything more than Pulp Fiction. Ever."

Tonight, Lor seemed, well... concerned about something. He kept sniffing the air where Dani was, and giving her weird looks. As he walked her out, he said something super, super fecked up.

"You gonna button that shirt up, or not? Showing too much skin these days, honey." He stopped, grabbed her chin, looked at her. "You gotta be careful about the... vibes you throw off. Don't want to end up in the wrong hands."

Dani blushed purple. Pretended she hadn't heard him, but as soon as she got out of Chester's, she buttoned her clothes up to the neck.

Fat lot of good it had done her. Because now she's surrounded on both sides by two Unseelie Princes, and she's got no magic cellphone, no annoying Lor or Ryodan's men three steps behind her, trying to be all stealth, no Ryodan himself. Not even Christian to defend her, since he's off playing pincushion to the Crimson Hag.

Dani is, in a word, fucked.

And then, terrifyingly, she is fucked. When Dani said she wanted to lose her virginity in an epic way, this is not what she meant. She meant epic good, not epic bad.

Her last conscious thought is that she doesn't want to die; doesn't want to lose track of who she is.

Her last conscious thought is something so stupid, a normal, non death-by-sex-faed Dani would have scoffed.

Her last conscious thought is, _this isn't fair._

The next night, Dani is back at Chester's. If people were paying attention, they'd notice something is off.

Ryodan always, always pays attention.

Dani is moving differently, for one thing. Not stomping around or hopping from foot to foot like a kid. No she slithers in, hip to hip, breasts pushed out, shoulders arched back. It's a walk that says - I've been down that dirty road, and I'm going to take you with.

She's dressed different, too: Tight and leather and heels. Dani right now is 16, almost 17, but way she's dressed she could be early 20s.

Way she's dressed, she's making Ryodan reconsider all those rules he made to himself, years ago back when Dani was a 13 year old Tasmanian devil, whirring about his club, teeth bared, and he watched her with what had been the beginnings of what felt like hope. And now here he is, and here she is, and he's reconsidering those rules he made about what's an appropriate age to make his claim, and what isn't.

Dani, basically, is not walking like Dani.

Ryodan decides to wait it out, to see what's happening. He's become quite the king at waiting, these aeons he's been alive. And if the past few years have made the waiting harder. He's a patient man.

He's more concerned with holding off the beast inside of him, the one who can scent, even from floors away, that something, someone that belonged to HIM, that belonged to him and him alone and should have, would have been marked exclusively by him - inside and out - when the time was right, smells like something else.

Smells fae.

He only realizes this as he feels the sword being shoved, slow and hard, into his stomach.

As he falls to his knees, he looks around and sees the rest of his men are bleeding out as well. Sees that behind the teen girl, with his blood on her hands, flank two Unseelie Princes. Pestilence and Famine. If Ryodan were a different man, he'd appreciate the poetry of that. Instead, he sees that the princes look better sated, better sexually satisfied, just better than they have ever looked. And Ryodan knows why. And Ryodan, dying Ryodan, doesn't even have to look at Lor to know how much they fucked up.

Doesn't have to look at Dani in the eye. Almost doesn't want to, because what looks back is wild and terrified and so, so, so hungry. What looks back in her eyes is what looks at him in the mirror some nights. Ryodan has no issues with his inner monster, never will. But right now the thing looking back in Dani's eyes is not just wild and hungry. It's screaming HELP ME, HELP ME, PLEASE PLEASE HELP ME.

So while Ryodan lays there, bleeding out below the sword of the no-longer-virginal Dani, for once he doesn't yell. Or accuse, or blame, or hold a grudge.

Instead, he carefully, gently, palms the trembling girl's cheek, and says to her,

"I'm sorry. This is my fault, Dani. I'll make this right, I swear."

With that, he dies, and Dani is too cold, too hot, too everything to realize that the tears she's weeping right now actually aren't blood.

And later, days later, when Ryodan comes back, and goes hunting her - finds her moments before she's about to stab herself with her own sword to end the anguish and pain - not even from the sex, but from being used, being a slave to someone else - he doesn't even let her apologize.

Just grabs her in his arms and tosses her sword to Lor. He doesn't even wait for Lor to kill them. Ryodan doesn't do vengeance. Doesn't really care to. He's not an animal, he's a machine. Instead, he freeze frames her to a room in Chester's Dani has never seen before. A room with nothing but candles and a bed.

And then. Then. Then, Ryodan does ... things. Lots of things, things like the UPs did and had been doing, and would never have stopped had Ryodan not put an end to it. (Because amidst the chiming and the fucking, a small part of Dani realized that for whatever reason, her nature meant that she was more satisfying to the UPs than any other woman they had ever had. Sidn't die easily, either, and that meant that she was going to be subjected to this, nonstop, forever.) But the freezing burn Dani had felt now becomes warm flames, insatiable but quenching. All the things the UPs had done to her, Ryodan now does. He and Dani now do together. And as Dani comes back to herself, she realizes two things:

1) That she now understands why Mac would never tell her about her time with Barrons when she was Pri-Ya

2) That she's not sure, will never be sure, who she hates more, Ryodan, or herself.

They're in that room for a very, very long time. And when Dani finally comes out? Well, she doesn't recognize herself anymore, not one bit.


	4. iv: Lor

_I don't wanna bend like the bad girls bend_

_I just wanna be your friend, i__s it ever gonna be enough?_

_(Metric, "Gold Guns Girls")_

**iv. (Or: Lor)**

Not many things take Dani O' Malley by surprise. (That she'd admit to, anyway.)

This takes the cake.

Dani doesn't start noticing Lor at first. Not really. At first, he's just fun to mess with, shoving elbows and stepping onto his toes when she's freeze framing her way into or out of Chester's. It's a game to lose him when he's tailing her, and she lets him have it, afterwards.

"Dude, you're supposed to be faster than me, stronger than me, all powerful and like, immortal and shit. But can't keep up with a little 14 year old girl? Jesus. You're pathetic."

She likes to rile him up; loves when he rolls his eyes skyward as if praying to a god she knows neither of them believes in to save him from her.

"You're annoying the fuck out of me right now, kid," he informs her, tapping her hard on the nose, but she knows he's not really pissed at her because those eternal eyes are all twinkly and stuff. "Also, you're stepping on my game. Go find something else to do."

Suddenly, Dani has another way to mess with him.

She'll watch him when he watches whatever bimbo blonde he wants that night prance around the bar drunk and make a fool of herself. He likes the big titted ones that bounce. Dani scowls. Bounce. Dani doesn't bounce, but she's filling out real nice and she's definitely ten times hotter than any of those other girls. Not that she cares, just that it's the truth, and she knows it. (And so should he. Obviously.)

So she'll zoom in on whatever girl he's angling in on. Sometimes she'll make shit up, tell her Lor's got some crazy STD he picked up from a Seelie Princess. This rarely deters the girl - if she is interested - so she'll try other tactics, like spill stuff down their shirts or just generally buzz around until she's a buzz kill.

Lor usually ends up taking one of them anyway. He's attractive, and when that doesn't work for him, well, he's never really been one to take no for an answer. So when he watches her mess with this night's piece of ass, he doesn't get pissed. Not really, though for some reason he still bitches to Ryodan about it; to anyone and everyone who will listen.

"You're a pebble stuck in my shoe. You know what I do with pebbles stuck in my shoe, kid?"

"Way I see it," Dani counters, "I'm doing those girls a favor. Free will, and all that. Besides, they're dumb. Why boink a dumb blonde?"

When Lor grins all slow and Ryodan laughs, Dani explodes.

"Don't go telling me blondes have more fun! I have plenty of fun."

Lor looks her up and down, and suddenly the look he's giving her is ... different. More similar to one that Ryodan has given her in the past.

"I bet you do."

Before Dani can consider it - she's almost sixteen now, after all, and has learned a few things - Ryodan speaks up from behind his desk. His voice is harsh.

"Lor, get the fuck out of my office. And kid, what are you doing, standing here and causing a distraction in my club. Didn't I give you a job to do."

Lor just pauses and raises his eyebrows at Ryodan, then laughs and heads out of the office - though not before he's given Dani what her American tv shows call a noogie.

So she watches him with yet another blonde.

Not sure why this matters to her. Lor is like Ryodan, another old dude... except not like Ryodan. Because Lor is fun, and likes to have it. Watches Kung Fu movies with her and Tarantino (although those, Ryodan stays for). Helps her train so she's faster. Lor taught her how to shoot a gun, much to Ryodan's eternal consternation. Has even forced her to start listening to Hendrix, and though Dani would never admit it, she ... kind of likes Jimi.

Dani's finally 16, and sex is frankly all. she. can. ever. think. about. Seriously. It's all sex, sex, sex and sex up in there. It's so bad she's beginning to consider going to Christian, but he scares her.

Instead, she tests out a theory, and starts bugging Lor with questions.

"So," she freeze frames over to him one night while he watches the crowd. Ryodan is somewhere else, so Lor is the man in charge. "Got a few questions for you, big shot."

"Yeah? What types of questions, honey?"

"Sex ones." Dani's gratified when Lor chokes on whatever it is he's drinking. For once, she has to Heimlich him, 'stead of the other way around.

"Don't you have a girlfriend to ask that? Where's Mac?"

At this, Dani's face darkens. Lor changes the subject. (He does that a lot, really. For a neanderthal with questionable taste in music, he's got class.)

"Okay, kid, shoot."

"Do men really like oral sex that much? Why?"

Lor chokes again. So does Fade, Kasteo, and the rest of Ryodan's men who are hanging around. They all trade glances and laugh, none say anything, except -

"Happy to show you, sweetheart," the big one Dani still doesn't know the name of offers.

"Don't even think about it," Lor counters, and they drop it.

Another time, a Seelie chick is making out with a human woman. And literally every male head in the joint has their eyes on them. Won't look away.

"Okay dude," Dani says, all cross-like, though she's not sure why. "Explain lesbians to me. And don't give me that "double of a good thing," because I like dudes but the idea of two dudes touching does _not_ turn me on." She pauses. Lor's not really paying attention to her, so she goes in for the kill. "Oh, wait, do you dudes like, watching dudes together? Maybe you even," and she waggles her eyebrows at them.

Barely a second later, she's been dumped unceremoniously onto Ryodan's desk. Which, EWW. Ryodan just raises his eyebrows.

"She was getting in the way of the show," Lor offers as explanation. "Done with babysitting duties for the night."

"Indeed," says Ryodan, then goes back to his paperwork and ignores a scowling Dani, except to say - purr, really - "You know, Dani, I'm happy to answer any of your ... questions. I'm always happy to teach."

Dani just closes her eyes and pretends to snore.

The next time, Dani watches as Ryodan's newest piece of ass rounds up the steps to Ryodan, who stands there, arms crossed, waiting. It's bugging her, really, really bugging her. She tries to tell herself that it's because of how he treated Jo, but ... well, she doubts it.

Something nudges her in the hip and she almost flies five feet. Lor gives her a glance that's sympathetic and knowing and annoying the piss out of Dani, so she decides to do the same back.

She flashes him a gamine grin. "So, what's with all the boob glitter? Do you dudes just, like, need it as a sign post to light the way? And if so, like, where else do you need a woman to put boob glitter? Oh, I know! Maybe on her -"

"Nope." Lor actually looks pissed this time. "Not taking the bait, honey."

It's only when they've defeated the most recent Big Bad, put the HFK back in the ground that she comes to terms with what she's been considering for a while now.

Dani's been considering a lot, recently. Two things in particular. First: The whole dying thing. Dani's escaped death one too many times, and she's starting to feel like Death's got her number - and she doesn't mean Christian, who has gone full UP these days. She keeps wondering if it's time to ask Ryodan again about the immortality thing, but then she glances at his men and a few of them have these looks in their eyes, like life is just too fecking long, and she reconsiders.

The other thing that's been nagging at her, she thinks she has a handle on.

Got no plans to die a virgin. Not Dani O' Malley. Not the Mega. Deserves the experience before she goes belly up.

Losing your virginity epically doesn't need to be romantically. Things are really, really messed up with Dancer these days - he's pissed and withdrawn and working on something he refuses to explain to her. Jo is an emotional wreck (still, Jesus). Mac is ... well, the less thought about that the better. And Ryodan is seriously weirding Dani out these days. If she didn't know better, she'd think -

Nope! Too much thinking. More action.

Christian may have had plans to do with Dani's virginity, but Dani's got some plans, too, and she's about to put them into motion.

When she proposes said plans to Lor - talking fast and trying to play it off all cool, cuz feck, she's an adult now, isn't she? She knows he can see right through her - he doesn't say anything for a moment. Then:

"Boss wouldn't like it."

"Who," Dani grits out between her teeth, "FUCKING cares what Boss likes or doesn't? I am so sick and tired of everyone treating him like he has the keys to the City that is Dani. He does not call the shots. _I_ call the shots. _I_ choose."

Lor goes quiet for a second, but Dani sees things on his face. Sympathy and curiosity and bemusement. Patience and darkness and ... pain? And lust. Enough lust to cause an avalanche. And ... suddenly she gasps. Maybe bit off more than she can chew this time, which -

- Well, is kind of the point, isn't it?

She swallows, and if she could see herself, she'd see that her eyes look the way they do when the UPs are trying to Pri-ya her. Almost.

"Do that again," Lor says.

* * *

Later, afterwards, after the first time (and the second and the third), Dani tries to ignore the fact that something feels... off. Like maybe an epic virginity loss to another superhero wasn't quite enough. Not that Christian's crazy ideas about chocolates and "sweet kisses" made sense but Dani's pretty sure there's a feeling missing. Like, she likes Lor, he's a cool dude, but ...

Whatever. Dani doesn't believe in love. Love is for idiots, and then for people like Mac. Dani doesn't believe in it. Doesn't deserve it, neither.

Still, she's a woman now. Dani checks herself in the mirror (if she thinks about that mirror for a second, she's going to think about ... other things, and she doesn't want to. Needs a clear, non-sex filled head for a bit). Doesn't look older either. A bit sore. But there is something different.

She pokes around in her head. Things for once are quiet, peaceful. If this is being grown up, maybe grown up ain't near as bad as she always thought.

Lor is watching her right now, on the bed (he took her to a real bed - imagine that!) very quietly. There's a smile on his face that doesn't quite reach his eyes.

"Mac once mentioned that you're into a lot of sadistic shit."

Lor laughs but doesn't even dignify it with an answer.

"You okay, honey?"

"Yea, I'm great. Sex is awesome. Thanks, dude!" She sobers up for a second, smiles. Time to act like an adult. "Seriously, Lor, thank you."

Lor looks like he's going to say something. He looks actually really angry for a second, all dark and shit - like the world can't keep fucking him over and he's ready to fuck it over right back. Like maybe there's not a lot that Lor will fight for, but now he's itching for that fight. Dani can't make sense of the look. Doesn't even want to.

Instead he says, "Honey, been real curious for a long time about the vibrating thing..." and then he's back on top of her and Dani stops thinking for a while. Better that way. Too much thinking.

* * *

"Where the fuck have you been."

Ryodan greets Dani as she's trying to sneak out of Chester's. It's the middle of the afternoon. After what literally must have been hours of sex, Lor, after looking for a second like he thought he should ... cuddle her or something? Dani shivers... took off to "take care of some stuff." And Dani decided she could finally brave sneaking out of Chester's.

Guess she was wrong. What the fuck else is new? She sighs.

"Didn't know you were looking for me, boss. Haven't seen you in a while either. Besides, it's the middle of the _fucking_ afternoon. Aren't you usually well, busy ... fucking?"

Ryodan raises his eyebrows at that. "Well, fuck, instead of feck. That's a first." Then his eyes narrow, and he's on Dani, fast. Dani's got self-preservation up the wazoo, and gut instincts. Right now, hers are telling her RUN. Don't need to know why to know that Ryodan finding out about her and Lor is bad for business. But Ryodan's got a tight hold on her, and he's sniffing her. And the look in his eyes is baaad. Real bad. Worse than that time a few years back when he found out she'd been in Christian's bed. Worse than when he caught Dancer kissing her. Dani ain't never seen Ryodan like this, and she's seen some real bad looks from him.

Dani tries to use that second to get out, but Ryodan manhandles her, drags her down to the basement, ties her up (at least no chains this time), and leaves her there. For three days. He visits a lot, but he just stares at her with murder in his eyes and refuses to say anything.

Dani, however, figures she's got a trump card. So when one of the other men comes in to bring her food, she asks about Lor.

The look she gets back is almost as bad as the one Ryodan's been giving her. He tells her that Lor's gonna be gone for a while.

"What the hell does that mean, gone," she explodes. "Where the hell'd he run off to."

One looks at the other, then laughs. "Had to pay the piper." Then he cocks his head at her. "Lesson to you, kid: Boss don't like when someone else touches his things."

Dani's not stupid enough to think that Ryodan considers Lor his thing. No. She knows what the dude meant. She hangs there for a few days, and refuses to look Ryodan in the face when he comes down, and plots to herself.

* * *

When Dani is finally let out, Lor is there. He quirks a grin at her, but won't even say hi. When she tries to move towards him, Ryodan is in her way.

"I wouldn't, Dani," he tells her, light fingers on her neck, not a choke but a warning. Behind him, she sees Lor, and she sees that scary look he had that almost-epic day she gave him her virginity.

No matter what she does, Lor keeps his disance. That burns. It burns, a lot. Even though Dani knows why, is pretty sure that Lor went wherever they go when they die - and Ryodan is the one who sent him there - she's still pissed off.

At least, Dani tells herself one night, alone in bed and trying not to consider the "alone" part of that - she doesn't have to watch Ryodan nod his head to the night's skank anymore. Ryodan's nightly ritual has changed. Now, he - personally - escorts her to "her" bedroom, makes a comment ripe with sexual innuendo that, though Dani finally understands, she refuses to respond to, then locks her in.

Yep, life at Chester's is grand.


	5. v: Christian

_Come and take a walk on the wild side  
Let me kiss you hard in the pouring rain  
You like your girls insane  
Choose your last words  
This is the last time  
_

_(Lana Del Ray, "Born to Die")_

**v. (Or: Christian)**

"Dude, uh, you're welcome. What, no thank you? I just saved your fecking life and all you can do is stand there and stare at me..."

Dani is covered in Unseelie guts and goop (like what-the-fecking-well-else-was-new). And it stinks, worse than a dead Rhino boy, worse than twenty dead slimey Rhino boys. Worse than Mom's body after she'd been lying there a few days and Dani was locked in and couldn't get help, get out...

Snap out of it, Danielle O'Malley.

Dani's taken to not just talking to herself in the second person, she's using her full name these days. Figures it will be a good wake up call for her not to be too impulsive.

Speaking of...

She stares up at the rigid man in front of her. His hair is black, his skin is gold, his tattoos make her dizzy with their movement until she wants to lie down and strip and maybe go to sleep but probably not, probably something else would be better...

Snap out if it.

...but his eyes. No fire. No spark. No changing colors. Flat and dark, like what they've been through is so horrible the person inside had to shut the blinds.

"Earth to Christian." Gentler this time. She reaches a hand out, tentative. Dani would never choose to touch an Unseelie Prince, part human Highlander hot dude or not. No one would. (No one smart, anyway.) But Christian is ... whatever he is right now, and it's because of her, because she couldn't make a fecking decision. The freeze framer froze.

It's okay now, because the Crimson Hag is dead. She almost took Dani with her, but Dani managed to duck at the last time, and lead her into an old warehouse where she ended up on a conveyor belt Dancer had helped her rig up, and then when she was all chopped up into pieces, Dani started stabbing the feck out of her, until all of her was dead.

So she fixed it, without anyone's help. (Ryodan.) And saved Christian, without anyone else's help. (Ryodan.) Just the way she likes it.

So Dani reaches her hand the rest of the way (fuck tentative) and touches him, and suddenly they are ...

...elsewhere. Dani blinks. She can't really make sense of it, except that it's vast and on one side, their side, it is all white and on the other side it is all black and there's a silver breaking the two in half and if she's not wrong...

"Danielle, my darling."

She looks up, and there Christian is. His eyes are focused, on her. Too focused, but he's been an Unseelie witch's yarn for the past year and a half, so she'll give him some slack there. He's sort of shifting back and forth between his Highlander, what he used to be glamour, and his current Unseelie Prince look. Or is it maybe the other way around?

"How you feeling? And where the hell are we?"

Christian quirks his mouth, and it ... doesn't look weird.

"Surprisingly, lass, fantastic, for having my guts ripped out of me nonstop for the past.." he stops, looking closer at her. "How long have I been... incapacitated? And where do you think we are?"

Of course. If Dani wasn't so overwhelmed, she would have caught it sooner.

"Why'd you bring me here?"

He shrugs. It should be weird to see an Unseelie Prince shrug. It's weirder that it isn't.

"Didn't even think it. Clearly my body just thought it ... felt right."

That speculative expression again. "Lass, how long have I been gone?"

"Almost a year and a half, dude. Took awhile to come up with a plan, but I know I could get you out."

Christian is grinning, and Dani is grinning back, and he's moving in closer to her.

"Did I remember to say thank you, lass?"

He seems more... normal than he has in a long time. And he's looking her up and down, not like an Unseelie Prince who just wants IN, but the way a hot, young dude checks out a girl.

"Past year and a half looks good on you, lass." He swallows, and his next words are hoarse. "Real good."

The words, the inflection, that low tone he has where it feels like liquid silk accidentally got thrown in the coffee grinder... all of it is doing things to Dani. And not in a, death-by-sex, not entirely of her own choice things done, but a - god I find you attractive even though I don't want to admit it and even a year and a half is a lot of time to grow up.

He turns from her, clenches his fists, than speaks over his shoulder.

"Dani, I need -"

She interrupts him, by reaching forward, placing her hand, lightly, on his stiff shoulder.

He shudders.

"Lass, you doona know what you're doing." That brogue's back in full force. Dani had no idea she missed it, not until now. "It's been ... well, too long since I, well, you know -"

"Fucked?" This she says with a raised eyebrow, trying to be alll nonchalant like, even though she's shaking inside. Fat lot of good it does her, anyway, since it's not like he has eyes in the back of his head.

Wait, does he? She's never really checked, and...

"Yes, fucked." He grits out. Dani's pulled back from her weird brain spaz. "So I really think it's best lass if you doona touch me and instead we get out of here and go back to Dublin where I can ... take care of matters, understand?"

Otherwise I won't be responsible for what I do. It's unspoken, but they both know he's saying it. Doesn't need to look at his eyes to see it.

"And would taking care of matters potentially kill someone? Wouldn't it be better to find ... an alternative?" Oh god, oh god. OhgodohgodohgodstoptalkingDa nistoptalking-

Now he turns around. Whips, actually. Scans her face. "Yes. But lass, if you're offering what I think you are, I could kill you, too."

Dani lets out an exhale, trying to keep the images from overrunning her mind. Won't do her any good if Christian turns her down.

Would he turn her down?

Why the hell and since fecking when is she hesitating? Dani O'Malley does NOT hesitate.

So she does something else. She takes a few steps towards the now shivering prince/Highlander, who can't take his eyes from her face. And she stands on her tiptoes. And she kisses him.

He freezes at first, then responds. Lightening fast, she's in his arms and his hands are running everywhere, one over her body, inching to virgin (literally) territory, the other cupping her face, her neck, playing with hair. Dani's been kissed before, has kissed before. But never like this.

Christian wrenches himself away. "Lass, this is your last chance. Walk away now, or..."

Dani kisses him again, and then they're kissing and he's covering most of his death-by-sex pri-Ya making stuff go, but not all of it. And if she's on fire and burning up from the inside, then it's the sweetest fire she's ever known.

And in the end, Christian does give her all those things he had threatened (or promised, depending on how you look at it) so, so many days ago. Chocolate, sweet kisses, music ... although not particularly in that order. He gives her more, too, and what he gives her makes her gasp and moan and then scream, loud, and if she weren't distracted, she'd be embarrassed because that was a very, very female scream.

And when Christian well... goes where no man has ever gone before, and he you know, conquers the land, so to speak, and jesus Dani needs to be less fecking uncomfortable with talking about sex now that she's had it! ... Once he breaches the barrier, he gets this triumphant look on his face. Like he's laughing in someone else's face. It's there for a second, then gone, and his attention is back on Dani, but ...

"Dude," she says as she munches away on the chocolate he so kindly provided. They're lying naked in a bed - not in the UK and Concubine's chamber, because the whole thing creeped Dani out and somewhere between time four and five made Christian take the party elsewhere, which meant that the partying continued well, in random spots down the hallway, in the gardens, even in the smaller library when Christian pushed her into the wall too hard and they knocked the door open...

"Sweetheart, doona call me dude again, or I'll find a way to hold it against you." She can feel him grinning above her.

"Anyway, just - this isn't some pissing contest thing with Ryodan, is it?"

"Why?" He sits up suddenly. "Did he do something?" Christian hisses, then growls, like he can't decide what he is, fae or human, devil or beast. "If he touched you, I'll rip his fucking heart out and feed it to him."

"What?" Dani's floored by this comment. Then brushes it off. "No, you two had this pissing contest, and I was clearly the piss's target. So just wanted to make sure that this wasn't like, just your way of winning." She scowls, as much at what seems like an unholy amount of vulnerability as the idea of her just being a prize at an arcade.

He relaxes, and then leans down till they're touching again. "Och, lass, do ya really think that I'd..."

Good enough. She freeze frames up to him, and then they get busy doing the dirty again.

Sex is. The. Shit.

* * *

Dani will never, ever fucking learn. Will she? How many goddamn times can she do the same thing, over and over again? Why doesn't she see patterns? Isn't she supposed to be smart?

Because when she and Christian finally leave the White Mansion, hand in hand, days later which means who knows? Maybe years have passed back in the real world, she has clearly forgotten the last time she was here.

Not that you could blame her. Last time, Dani was running with Christian away from the Crimson Bitch, while doing her best not to touch Christian, standing under a pile of guilt because she. let. her. out.

This time, it takes them forever to leave, and not just because of touching. Somehow, and Dani doesn't know and frankly for once, doesn't fecking care, Christian is back to being Christian. Maybe just all that time having nothing to do but scream in misery forced you to like, have an epiphany and be your you. Who knows? It's not like Christian is all Christian. But the moments where he's been talking crazy and the moments where he's just a twenty-something college dropout with a shit ton of power and sex appeal. Which Dani is a fan of.

Didn't you hear? Sex. Is. The. Shit.

Which is what she is in the process of saying to a laughing Christian, who tells her they'll have to alert the presses, run a special Dani Dailey, with a headline that reads -

Dani never gets to hear what Christian's idea for a headline is. There's a spear protruding from his chest. Mac's spear.

Dani turns, puts herself in between him and Mac. She sees black. She sees red. She sees blood. Her eyes are wet, but not from blood.

But it's not Mac standing there. Of course it fucking isn't.

Ryodan stands there, silent.

Didn't even see him fucking coming.

She crouches down by Christian, and for a few seconds, they have what would seem like a tragic movie ending. But he ruins it, raising an eyebrow at Ryodan.

"I'd rather have you die slowly and painfully, Highlander." It's like Dani's not even there.

"Bad idea," Christian says back to him, and then he's pulling Dani down to him and his hand is over her heart, and he starts saying something urgently into her ear, something in old English. Now is so, so not the time to be quoting poetry to her.

"Quick, lass," he says, "repeat after me." and even though Dani thinks it's ridiculous, she'll fulfill a dying man's (no, please no, not another) last request, so she repeats every word after him. And with every word, she can feel ... something, something that's clearly magic and it's like the Crimson Hag is still alive because she can feel something in her being stitched to something in Christian:

"If aught must be lost, will be my honor for yours. If one must be forsaken, will be my soul for yours. Should death come anon, will be my life for yours. I am -"

Behind her, Ryodan is roaring. And Dani never gets to hear, gets to say, what she and Christian are. Instead, suddenly both Ryodan and Christian is gone, and when he returns, he drops Christian at her feet and Dani has lost one more person. Someone who meant more. More than Jo, more than Kat. Maybe even more than Dancer. This time, something was ripped from her. Something that was supposed to be HERS.

Dani remembers once upon a time, in a world that was entirely winter, when Ryodan accused her of only causing death and pain to the people closest to her. Did he know at that time that he was the one who would cause it?

The two of them stare at each other, and Dani makes sure what she's thinking is clear in her eyes when she telegraphs it to him.

_I told you, once, never to take anything from me that's mine._

In his eyes are multitudes, layers and layers of words, but on the top is this

I_ told you I wouldn't, unless you made me. And so no there is no confusion, you are mine. No one else's. Not even your own._

When he grabs her, she doesn't even bother to freeze out, just shoves her eyes shut and commits Christian to memory. Dani's got a photographic memory, and now she's going to try for that whole moving image thing. She's going to relieve the past few days for the rest of her life.

* * *

Dani can be patient, too. So when Ryodan finally starts to let up on the whole imprisonment thing, she takes the opportunity to pull a new look together. Black skirt, black tank top, eyeliner and lipstick and stillettos. And that night at Chester's, she walks in, real slow, and when she can feel his eyes on her, she gives him a look she's seen other women give to men.

He freezes, and when he motions her upstairs, she comes.

"You know how badly you fucked up, Dani. Don't fuck with me again."

She smiles, all sultry. Having sex has taught her body new ways to twist and turn, lean this way, or that. Or maybe she always knew. She walks up to him, puts her hands on his chest. No heartbeat. Fucking figures.

He freezes. So still. A statue. Doesn't even breathe. She leans in, slides her lips over his cheek, to his ear.

"Disappointed," she says, and slides her sword right between his ribs.

When Ryodan comes back to Chester's a few torturous, raging days later, Dani just kills him again.


	6. vi: Alpha and Omega (AKA Ryodan: Redux)

_You couldn't sleep for the awful fright  
That kept you up in bed last night  
But curious shapes shift in the dark,  
They vanish with the sunrise spark_

**vi. (Or: Ryodan, Redux)**

Dani has been having some fecking fucked up dreams lately.

First off, what is with this whole dreaming thing? Dani's never dreamed before. Usually, she's so drained after days of buzzing around that she just conks out into blissful nothing.

(This is a secret, and a big one: Sometimes it's just too exhausting being Dani, and she needs to just lay her head down and close her eyes and shut down into nothingness.)

But for the past few months, every time Dani sleeps she … dreams. Nightmares, actually. Ones where she sweats and moans and moves and when she wakes up in the morning, her fecking hand is down her fecking panties, and she's terrified as shit that Ryodan has cameras in here, too. And even though she's pretty sure in the dream that she's come, and more than once, when she wakes up she needs so badly she hurts. Dani's never given a crap about pain, can handle it with the best of them, but this? This is torture.

Dani's still a virgin. Still never even kissed a boy. Had a moment one time where it seemed like Dancer was going to kiss her; it didn't happen. Lately, Christian has been fucking around with her, bringing her on the brink, but she's been threatening him with the sword and he's been backing off, a bit. She flirts with Lor sometimes, mainly just to piss Ryodan off.

Dani's still a virgin, but in her dreams she's not. Actually, to be more precise, in her dreams she starts as a virgin every. goddamn. time, then loses it to one of the men constantly orbiting her life. And then something shitty happens. And that shitty has a name.

Luckily, that SOMETHING (note, something, not someone), thankfully, never plays leading man. The only dream she has where Ryodan plays opposite her feels like a near miss, and it pisses her off - who the fuck does Ry-O think he is, nodding at her. Right. Like she's some skanky sheep willing to be that night's booty call. Not the Mega. The fire, the frustration, and the final satisfaction in the dream is a goddamn relief because these days when she's with him, she's seeing, feeling, something else. Noticing stuff she wishes she didn't, and pretty sure that she's walking some tightrope and the tightrope is burning up behind her and all she can do is go forward, fast, too fast, even for Dani, or she'll fall into the abyss below. The next day, she smirks around him, because in her dream, she's the one chick who turned him down, who he couldn't have.

When he looks at her, it's like he knows somehow, and when he shows her his fangs she knows it's not a real smile.

The next time Dani crashes (this time, a whole week, no sleep), her dreams move from PG-13 into R-rated territory. She dreams about Dancer. It starts off sweet and warm and when he is inside her, it's like the sunlight that usually warms his skin, but everywhere. But when her dream gets weird, and he morphs into the Unseelie King, something in her goes, oh. Now when they hang, she watches him super, super carefully.  
For a while, things are … quiet. Until things jump up, fast, into really, really heavy R rated territory. Not quite a porno, but it's getting there. That one at least wasn't so scary, just made her uncomfortable around him that whole week. Had to be real careful, because the last thing she needed was Ryodan giving her shit about how she had a crush on Lor and Barrons.

The worst of course, is the Unseelie Princes. That time, Dani wakes up with tears in her eyes, and she's not sure what for or why. And to add goddamn insult to injury, now she can't fucking picture Ryodan without picturing what happened in her dream. She gets now why Ryodan calls it fucking - if he's anything in real life like he was in that pri-ya nightmare, boinking doesn't even begin to cover it.

"What's with you." He asks her the day after the UP dream. Dani refuses to look at him.

"Nothing, boss." He reaches for her chin, but she freeze frames away, fast. "Didn't sleep well. Do you even do that? Sleep?"

He doesn't answer her. Dani is panicking, 'cuz last thing she needs is for him to reach in her head and … see stuff. Not about to give him that sort of power over her. So what if she thinks he's kinda hot? She's 16, it's natural. Just cuz she thinks he's hot doesn't mean she doesn't still hate him. Basically.

Then he's on her, and his hand is on her chin, and she knows he's about to do his X Ray vision thing into her head. In her panic, she does something real, real dumb.

"What. The Fuck, kid." He pulls back, rubbing his hand and stares at her. "Why did you bite me."

"Felt like it." She flashes a gamine grin at him, even though she's just flashed into freeze frame and she's vibrating all over the place and papers are flying everywhere.

He looks at her, considers, and she knows he's about to go digging inside her head again. So she does her second, surprising thing of the night.

"Please, Ryodan," and she hates the sound her voice makes, the way the P and L combination taste on her tongue.. "Just let it be. Some things... I need this to be private, okay?"

And Ryodan does something equally surprising.

"Okay. For now."

* * *

Dani decides that it's staying at Chester's that's screwing her. No, no, screwing with her. Dani is making more and more Freudian slips these days. Fuck Freud. The little shit knew nothing about women, or orphans for that matter. Anyway, for a while, Chester's was going swell. She and Ryodan had come to a sort of compromise on the subject. Dani stays at Chester's, checks in, and answers her magic cellphone when he calls, and he lets her come and go without a goddamn escort. Doesn't even lock her in anymore. And she's grown used to it, but probably being around that much sex and testosterone is fucking with her hormones and is to blame for all the sex dreams she's been having lately. Not to mention the camera thing. If she finds out he's been watching her … you know, she's going to smash every single fucking one of those cameras, and then kill him again.

It's an easy enough fix. When Ryodan announces work is done for the day, she heads upstairs, past his office, past Ryodan and his fucking head nod to whomever, down the hallway to a door with a sign on it that says, "Dani's. Keep the feck out or I'll feck you up." Lor laughed when he saw it, but nobody has taken it down. Nobody's given it mind, either. She'll go to her room, with its huge, comfortable bed and TV and piles of DVDs and books, an arsenal of candy bars and even chocolate pop tarts, and let them close the door. She'll pretend to be asleep when Ryodan comes by to check to make sure she's still there, and even though they both know she's just faking it, he'll wander off. She'll wait a bit, until the time she knows Ryodan has some chick with him (he's like clockwork, that guy, having sex at the same time, all the time. Thank god the walls are thick, or she'd lose her mind), and the rest of the men have probably gone down to level 4.

And then she'll zoom the fuck out of there.

But the annoying thing is that he's present in every single one of them. Extending a hand, making her watch as his men take Dancer down, getting between her and Lor and then locking her up, touching her cheek and vowing to fix it after she's killed him. And she can feel him. Breathing down her neck, his hand on her arms like a vice. And then inside of her, all around her, a feeling that Dani doesn't even know how she knows, but it's destroying her and even when she gets her damn equilibrium back, it's time to get away.

If Ryodan knows she's been sneaking out like some kid after curfew, he doesn't say anything. The bastard's full of surprises these days.

Leaving Chester's doesn't help. Dani runs into Christian, things get tricky, and that night she has the most ridiculous dream. Like, all flowers and chocolate and music and silly romantic stuff Dani doesn't really want. But in the dream, she's in love with him, and it's all perfect and magical. And the end of course, is ruined by Ryodan, who comes in and kills Christian, just in the middle of them getting married, some weird old fashioned Druid way. Which is just nuts, because 1) Dani is never getting married, and 2) How the feck would she know how druids get married? And then she kills Ryodan, on purpose, and it's pretty awesome.

That, more than anything else, makes it easier to look him in the eye these days.

* * *

On her 17th birthday, Dani's out, looking for Dancer who's gonna beyond AWOL, when her phone rings she reconsiders throwing it in the Liffey.

As if that would help.

"Aw, come on, boss. It's my birthday! I'm like, officially an adult. Need to celebrate. You gotta give me the night off."

"Get your ass over here." He hangs up.

When she drags her ass into Chester's, Lor grins at her. Looks her up and down. Dani's gotten a hell of a lot better at controlling her blush.

"Sure you're only 17, honey?"

"Sure you're only 30?"

He laughs. "Got you something."

He hands her a box, wrapped and everything. Only person who ever gave her gifts was Mac. Mac, who has been MIA with Barrons doing god knows what, who knows where. Dani could really, really use Mac these days.

She tears it open, then freezes, goes all slow mo joe.

"Dude," Dani says, appreciatively.

"Like it?"

Dani picks up the gun, considers it. Not that she has any interest in killing humans, but it slows Unseelie down, and it feels great in her hand. Heavy and hard and … nope. Not going there.

"Lor, you are the fecking shit, you know that, right?"

"You keep telling him that, you don't know what you'll start."

She jumps. Ryodan's behind her, and she can't even think about words without thinking about placement without thinking about position without thinking about …

She turns to him.

"Boss."

"Upstairs."

She follows him. A part of her wants to bitch, to dude him, to play at being 14 again.

Instead she's silent.

In his office, he closes the door, turns to her. Crosses his arms, says nothing, just nods to his desk. On it is a piece of paper. Nothing else. She moves closer to look.

It's her contract, with her blood. Should be dried black from the years its been hanging out in his desk drawer, but where it dripped onto the runes, it glows gold.

Dani is speechless. Then pissed.

"What, for my birthday you were gonna rub it in my face that you essentially own me? That I promised you who the fuck knows what for my entire goddamn life? All to save Jo's life, which was fucking pointless since you didn't even keep her alive, you fuck, even though you were fucking her?!"

Dani's pretty sure that's the most she's ever said fuck at one time, ever. If Mac were here, she'd chew her out, but Mac's MIA, and Dani's her own damn woman. Ryodan just leans against the door, watching her. Doesn't even interrupt her as she screams.

Oh, right, never mind, she isn't.

"Are you extending it? Adding more fucking caveats? I thought we finally were on the same wavelength. You know what, fuck it. Just kill me. I'm sick of your gilded cage."

"You done."

Dani collapses into a chair, suddenly worn out. She feels old, really, really old, and massages her temples as she looks at him but doesn't say anything else.

"Tear it up."

Once again, she's speechless. Shock, or something? It grips her on the inside, doesn't feel good. Dani's not an idiot, but she's also not about to admit that tearing it up feels wrong, somehow.

"Is this some kind of trick?"

"No." He moves over to her then, and she can feel the air molecules he's disturbed.

"You've finished your prison sentence. You're free to do what you want."

There's a weight in Dani's chest. Opposite feeling than what she's expected.

"Why."

"You're free to be your own woman. Isn't it what you always wanted." His mouth mocks her, his eyes say something else.

Dani, for some reason, remembers a time, long ago, when she saw Mac inside BB&B, and was jealous for one second of the border collie, loved and cared for, curled up by the fire. How she was just the mangy dog looking in.

"Am I being like, excommunicated or something?"

"No. Stop dithering, kid. You want to rip it up, rip it up."

"Don't. Fucking. Call. Me. Kid." Dani's pissed. Shouldn't be, not sure why, only that she feels like she was tied to an anchor and that anchor broke and she's drifting off to sea and there's a huge ass tidal wave coming.

"Are you, Dani?" She's so pissed it takes her a second to realize that Ryodan's talking like a normal human being. He hasn't moved, hasn't taken his eyes off of her, like he doesn't need to be up close and personal to see inside her head. "Are you a kid? Or are you an adult? Are you ready to grow the fuck up? Choose now. I'm not going to ask you again."

Four question marks. Dani manages to pull one out of him, every once in a while, but never four in a row. She's speechless.

In response, she freeze frames to him, grabs the contract. Next second, it's shredded in little pieces, all over his desk and the floor. For a second, she expects something fucked up to happen - die or a cage to descend.

Nothing does.

Ryodan presses a button below his desk. The door slides open. Out there, it's loud and frenetic and not nearly as overwhelming as this office. She hasn't felt frozen like this since the HFK.

"Happy Birthday," he tells her, and then he's pulling a pile of papers from behind him and doing work like she's not even there.

Dani doesn't even realize she's doing it, only that something in her explodes and then she's somehow right next to him and her mouth is on his and she barely has the time to think, well, feck. Had she known it was like this...

Dani is no longer on her own two feet. Instead, Ryodan's got her, and she's climbing all over him, and he's kissing her like he's trying to eat his way inside of her and that tightly wound place inside of Dani is out of control, and the shreds of her contract are whirring round his office like little paper butterflies on speed. She closes her eyes, dizzy.

This isn't what a girl's first kiss should be like, but Dani's a woman and in her dreams she's done way, way more than that and -

"Who the fuck cares about should anyway."

When he pulls back from her, sets her down, they're no longer in his office. She was so caught up, she didn't even feel him move. She's never seen this room before. Everything is sleek and modern, dark wood and chrome and glass. There's a bed, a huge one, low to the ground, covered in white. A book, an old one, lies open on top of it. Nothing else.

Dani feels wobbly, hates it, so she turns her back to him. She's vibrating all over the place, wanting to jump back on him, throttle him, turn and run and never look back.

"Dani," and something in his voice, something urgent and unfamiliar, forces her to stop moving and look at him. What stares back at her is alien, and vicious, and cruel. His eyes, usually so clear, are going red. Dani's only ever seen him like this a few times, and she's pretty sure he's talking around fangs right now.

"I told you once," and he takes a single step closer to her, "that I'm an extremely patient man. That I would wait for a long time for what I wanted." He takes another step, and Dani, who never backs off in a Texas stand off, feels her feet move backwards without her permission.

"You get a choice," Ryodan continues, "right now. Walk out of this door, and I'll leave you alone for the rest of your offensively short life. Or you can stay. It's a concession I've never made for anyone else. It's a concession I'll never make again."

Dani thinks of the shreds of that contract, and she thinks she gets it, and her throat is closed like all the times she chokes on candy bars.

"But know this," and now he's right in front of her, "I can make compromises. I can concede. But I do not, will not change. I don't do take backs, Danielle O'Malley."

Dani tries reaching for her anchor, or crossing back over the tightrope to the side of the canyon she left behind, but someone got metal cutters and the chain holding her boat still is broken and there's barely any tightrope left under her feet and she's falling and she's drowning and she knows either she can sink deep or grab the hand that's just been offered, open, palm up, in front of her.

Just like in her dream.

Ryodan doesn't move, just leaves his hand there. Dani doesn't move either.

(Looking back, she'll claim that time itself froze, but Ryodan will laugh and tell her she's fucking full of it and being 17 does not mean she gets to go ahead and be a drama queen.)

Then, slowly , almost as if she's in a dream, she takes a step back from him.

Ryodan's hand drops, then fists. Something weird starts going on with his face, but Dani can't see, because she's pulling her shirt over her head, trying to be all sexy like sexy people are, but she's shaking and vibrating and somehow her shirt gets caught over her head and she's stumbling around like a fucking idiot.

She hears a roar, and realizes it's laughter, and then a pair of strong arms pull her shirt off the rest of the way.

"Damnit," she mutters, while he laughs. "Don't you fucking laugh at me right now, dickhead. Ever heard of ruining the moment?"

He laughs so hard, he doubles over, and she now knows that when Ryodan was fucking that girl down on level 4 when she was just a kid and spying on him, that wasn't really joy. Doesn't even come close to what she sees right now.

Whatever. She doesn't care, she's so embarrassed and angry. And don't," she says as she shimmies out of her jeans, and now Ryodan is staring at her like he can see through her, and is shaking, and they both know it, so HA!, "ever. fucking. call. me. Danielle."

"I'll call you whatever the fuck I want to," he tells her, and then he's on her again.

And it's everything at once, and so much better than a few lousy sex dreams, better than bullshit porn. Better than freeze framing her way around the city and laughing it up with Mac and steak and the sunset and everything that Dani has ever loved... it's almost better than killing Unseelie.

(Aw, who is she's kidding. Screw killing Unseelie. Right now, Dani could give a crap about Unseelie. Sex is The. Fucking. Shit. It's like, the best fucking shit ever. Top of the shit pile.)

She tells Ryodan that, while he's inside her. And did she mention that superheroes just do it better? She feels bad for normal folks. They can't freeze frame, and they can't like, isolate certain muscles, and they can't...

"You do realize you just compared fucking me to excrement."

"Get familiar with this century, old man, words change."

"Get familiar with a dictionary, _kid_." This, he punctuates with his body and _Holy Feck that's amazing._"People change."

"Thought you said they didn't."

"I have been known to be wrong."

There you go, a concession from the king. Triumphant is Dani.

* * *

When they emerge, literally days later, the club is a complete mess. Lor is more irritated than she's ever seen him, and as soon as Ryodan and her walk in (not holding hands or anything because Gah, who the hell do you think they are? Batman and Robin don't hold hands) Lor stands up, declares he's never looking after anything or anyone, ever again, and disappears, she assumes, to go do the nasty with some blonde down in the bar.

Mac is back, and all she has to do is look at Dani and Ryodan, and she just knows, which is … embarrassing. Because Dani might be like, the Sex Goddess, and Ryodan's Best Lay Ever (well, according to her, at least). But she's still 17 and doesn't really want to be talking about this stuff in public. Sometimes the fact that she's with someone who has lived a gagillion years is weird, creepy even, but then she remembers that the world is different, and she is different, so who the feck cares? Mac looks ready to kill Ryodan, and Ryodan smiles back like he's ready to kill her, and Mac smiles at him like she has some trump card over Ryodan, and Dani is pissed.

"Aw, you're kidding. Seriously? You're still holding out on me?" But Barrons breaks it up, says something to Ryodan along the lines of, they agreed. Besides, Barrons says, they've got bigger problems.

Apparently, there's a new Unseelie terror in town, and the world is going to shit, and Christian has been by a few times and from what she's hearing, he's looking for blood. Ryodan doesn't seem to give a shit, but Dani reminds him that just cuz he can't die doesn't mean she can't, and he mutters some nonsense about someone getting too big for her britches. His men make some lewd suggestions that has Dani blushing and she's off, zooming around the club, and just as payback, she decides to stab a few Unseelie with her sword and cause a fucking scene, which has Ryodan roaring and her back under lockdown, freaking chains and all (which, um, well, never mind that). And Dani is escaping and he's chasing her down and they're yelling at each other and they fight, like, actually fight, and it's like they're back at square one but better because now Dani has one hell of a trump card, too. And she's going to find out whatever it is he's hiding from her. She always does, anyway. She's the Mega.

Ryodan absolutely, positively, refuses to call her that. Not even in bed. Not even if she begs, and she's embarrassed to admit it, but she has. Says he'll only do it if she starts addressing him as My Lord and Master, both in private and in public.

"Never. Going. To. Happen."

_So rise, and shine  
Nows the time to be alive  
To stay awake with me a while, and smile  
__(The Submarines, "1940")_


End file.
